


In the First City Stands a Monument

by merriman



Category: Seedship (Video Game)
Genre: Don't copy to another site, Gen, ice planets, journeys, space colonies, storytellers - Freeform
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-12-24
Updated: 2018-12-24
Packaged: 2019-09-26 07:55:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,005
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17137946
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/merriman/pseuds/merriman
Summary: When they landed, it was hard. Not everyone survived. Eighteen years later, one person is going to meet the people who were there before humanity arrived.





	In the First City Stands a Monument

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ellen_fremedon](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ellen_fremedon/gifts).



> I wanted to write this as soon as I saw Seedship in the nominated fandoms. I hope you enjoy this treat!

"Tell me again," Bera asked the computer. "Tell me about the first days."

In the confines of her tent, Bera settled in to listen to the story she'd heard so many times before.

"Would you like to begin from the decision to land, or from the landing?" the computer asked. Bera privately thought of the computer as her grandmother. She knew she must have had one. Two, really. But her mother had told her that her grandparents had died long before her parents had decided to join the colony ship that left Earth so long ago. Even if they hadn't, no one on Morozko knew what had happened to Earth, and it had taken so very long to get to their new home, no one they'd known could still be there, even if Earth had somehow managed to survive.

"From the decision," Bera said. She had set up a scanner on her tent and looked at the camera view from outside. It was snowing again. 

"We had visited seven planets already," the computer told her. "None of them were deemed suitable for the colony."

"Why not?" Bera asked. She knew why not, but this was part of the routine. This was how she passed the time when she was out on her own, away from the dome that held the beginnings of their city. Their first city.

"Planet one was deemed unsuitable due to excessively unstable geology," the computer told her. "As well as toxic plant life that would certainly have caused many deaths before the colony had a chance to grow enough. Combined with scarce resources, those factors made the first planet unsuitable."

Bera nodded as she checked on her dinner. The pouch it was in was warming it up for her, but it wasn't quite ready. She took a sip of her tea and looked out at the view again, angling the camera up so it looked into the sky. The moon was in view behind the drifting clouds and snow flurries and Bera tried to magnify to see it more clearly, but the tent camera had its limitations, so she contented herself with being able to see it at all.

"What about the next planet?" she asked.

"The next planet was deemed unsuitable due to corrosive atmosphere combined with a complete lack of water."

"And the next?"

"The third planet was deemed unsuitable due to dangerous animals and outstanding ugliness." 

That was one of Bera's favorite bits of the story. Outstanding ugliness. She couldn't even imagine. Especially since Morozko was so very beautiful. Some of the other kids didn't think so, but Bera always had. After all, they had the caves to the south with ice that glowed blue and yellow and pink depending on the time of day and what angle the sun hit through a hole in the cave ceiling. They had the Down Trees, which looked like they were covered in tiny feathers like the ones Bera had seen in the library database. They grew leaves of ice in Morozko's summer, veined with water encased in cellulose. They were sweet and beautiful and Bera spent much of her summer every year volunteering to go harvest the leaves as treats for her friends.

Bera ate her dinner as the computer described the rest of the dismissed planets. One had been a barren rock with no resources, no water, no animals, no plants. Just bare dust and rock and a flimsy atmosphere the computer had concluded might be ripped away at some point. One had been so hot the seas boiled. The sixth had been almost perfect, but the computer had judged the moon to be unstable and even as it had taken the colony ship out of the system, it had observed the moon's orbit decay further. The seventh planet had been a honeycomb of caves full of dangerous ruins and almost no gravity. 

Bera liked to imagine what it would have been like to live on that last one, bounding through caverns and sidestepping crumbling ruins with a leap. But she had also asked the computer once to explain what sorts of ruins could be so dangerous. 

_"Traps, weapons left behind, as well as unstable buildings and roads,"_ the computer had informed her. It had even provided helpful pictures of some of the ruins it had in its database under 'dangerous/deadly/inimical to life' and they weren't so much exciting as terrifying. 

"And then you found Morozko," she said as the computer finished listing all the planets it had been to.

"We did, yes," the computer said. "Would you like the list of other encounters and events that occurred on the journey?"

The journey had been very long and the list of events went on and on and on. Bera smiled. "No," she said. "We don't have time tonight."

There had been a comet and two probes from alien races who might well be long dead by now. The computer had observed new planets being born and avoided a star about to go nova. 

"Tell me about landing," Bera asked. Above her, according to the camera, the sky had cleared and the snow had stopped. Ribbons of light danced across the sky, lighting it green and pink. Her mother had told her that on Earth, they had something similar. They called them the Northern Lights, because you didn't really see them anywhere but the far north of the planet. Here, they just called them Morozko's Dance and Bera watched them as the computer continued.

"The landing systems were damaged," the computer began. This was a sad part of the story and Bera tugged her sleeping bag tightly around herself. 

"One landing strut collapsed under the high gravity of this planet and twelve lives were lost. Abidi, Adams, Cataldo, Garcia, Guo, Ilves, Korhonen, Lucas, Lu, Miller, Miller, Sokolov." Bera spoke the names along with the computer. While she knew that their ship's computer didn't have emotions the same way that humans did, Bera was certain that the ship still mourned every single one of those twelve lives. One had been Bera's mother's twin sister. The computer had apologized to her personally. The landing apparatus had been damaged because of a choice the computer had made. Rotate to avoid an asteroid and damage the landing gear? Or rotate a different way and lose either life support systems or the construction gear. The ship had determined that life support was too important and it would have to improvise on landing. Who knew? Had life support been damaged, they might well have lost half the colony. 

Morozko's Dance continued above Bera, shifting into blues and golds. 

"A meteor shower is predicted for tonight," the computer interrupted. "In approximately one hour. Would you like to position the camera in that direction when it occurs?"

"Sure," Bera agreed. By then the Dance would be over. She might well be asleep, but if she was awake then it would be good to see it. "Record it if I fall asleep?"

"Of course," the computer assured her. "Would you like to continue?"

"Yes," Bera said, nodding. Her tea was still warm and she took another sip. "Please."

"When the decision was made to land on this planet, the Landing Crew were awoken."

Bera's mother had been among the Landing Crew. They'd had the important job of being the first ones awake to prepare for the arrival in case of an emergency. As it had turned out, they'd needed them. Seventeen more cryo-pods had been damaged in the landing, disconnecting from the life support systems, but the quick actions of the Landing Crew had gotten those seventeen people awake and out before they'd suffocated in their pods.

"After Landing, the temporary shelter was deployed. The planet was known to be incredibly cold, but all other aspects appeared to be well within acceptable parameters. In addition, the plant and animal life on this planet was shown to be of potential benefit to a colony started here. Warm clothing was produced by the construction apparatus and insulated tents and domes were constructed as well, including the tent you are now using, Bera."

Bera smiled. This had been her parents' tent when they had first landed. She'd kept it specially for this journey. They had used it whenever they'd had to go out to harvest ice or when they'd gone to try and find some of the animals that lived in the caves nearby. Her father had brought back the first of the colony's Snowbats on one such journey and Bera turned her outside camera to check on the pair she had with her. They were fine, roosted on the sled, not caring one bit about the snow and the cold. Snow had even accumulated on top of Ika, though Voka had shaken off what had landed on him.

"It was hard for them, wasn't it," Bera said, yawning as she turned the camera back to the sky. "Mama said it was hard, but good."

"Reports from colonists during the early days agree with her assessment," the computer told her. "The cold did make everything more difficult for them. Food could be found under the ice. Water could be obtained easily. Mining operations were planned for the caves to the east of the original landing site and plans are still in place to visit the planet's moon if more resources are needed."

"Or just to visit," Bera added. After all, they had plenty of what they needed right here on Morozko. 

"Or just to visit," the computer agreed. "With food and water sources found and plans made, permanent structures were constructed. Ninety-nine lives were lost over the course of the following year."

They had a list of those too, and Bera and the computer recited them together. Her parents had lost friends. The colony had lost one of its new leaders. A tenth of the colony, gone. Most had been due to colonists underestimating the effect of the cold. Bera still had nightmares about the stories her parents and the computer had told her. Now, all children of the colony were taught from an early age just how to cope with the cold of their new home.

"Two years after Landing, the first human child was born on Morozko," the computer continued. "That is you, Bera."

Bera knew that. She had always known that. She had beaten out her best friend, Lilla, by a week. Twenty-eight children had been born within two months of each other. But Bera had been the first. That was why she was out here now. She'd always known she'd be the one to volunteer.

"Thank you," she told the computer. According to her clock, it was well into the night now. She had an early morning ahead of her. She would miss the meteor shower, but they happened all the time. She could watch the recording. Bera finished her tea, cleaned the mug and packed it away into her things, then bundled herself up in her sleeping bag and fell asleep under the now purple and turquoise lights of Morozko's Dance.

At dawn, Bera woke to the sounds of the snowbats outside keening to each other as they hunted for their breakfast. They would find the burrowing crystal rats that had gotten close to the tent at night and take care of them well before Bera was ready to take the tent down. She had a quick breakfast, heating more tea and gulping it down while it was almost too hot to stand, then packed up her sleeping bag. The dry shower the tent had wasn't her favorite way of cleaning up, but it was better than arriving at her destination all travel-dirty and smelling of food and the tent's fabric. Ika and Voka had landed on the tent and were thrumming together, making it vibrate as they digested their breakfast. 

When she was all packed up, Bera got ready to face the cold. She layered on her clothes and outerwear, making certain to seal the cuffs of her coat sleeves to her mittens and her collar to her mask and scarf. The sealing fabric had been developed when she was seven, bonding to itself with hard pressure and then peeling away with a good tug. It wasn't perfect, but it did mean that no little tendrils of cold could work their way through a tiny gap at your neck. 

Packing up the tent was quick work. The sun was just coming up over the horizon and Bera had the tent packed away into its sack before long. Ika and Voka took flight above her, sending out their cries ahead of her as they flew. Bera heard an echo back that sounded off.

"Crevasse that way, hm?" she said to them. Ika circled back to her and landed on her shoulder. Voka continued to fly around her head as Bera got the sled ready and started them moving. 

The bats guided her on her way as she drove the sled. They warned her of crevasses and thin spots in the ice. They kept her company and trilled to her as they circled back and landed, only to take off again. Bera knew she should stop for lunch. She couldn't very well eat while she was on the sled. She needed the tent for that. But she didn't want to lose any time. If she was going to make it by nightfall, she would just have to press on.

The sun was low in the sky and the snow under her sled's runners was getting icy and crunching under them as she went, when Bera spotted something in the distance. Ika was perched on the sled's nose but Voka was out ahead and came zipping back, chirping a greeting that said to Bera that he had found something, something big, something so big, something good. Bera reached up and gave his head a pat with one mittened hand, then held on tight as she increased her speed. If there had been anything to worry about, Voka would have warned her. 

Closer and closer now. She could see a wall ahead of her, and buildings behind it. Her sled's runners stopped making noise as she reached a smoothed out road that led to a gate in the wall. Bera followed it, stopping at the gate and getting off.

She had just reached up to bang one fist on the gate when it opened before she could touch it.

Behind the gate she could see buildings of ice and crystal and the pinkish metals so common in the cave systems. There were no people to greet her, however, and Bera hesitated, unsure of whether she was as welcome as she'd been led to believe.

"Please join us in the hall," a voice said. Bera recognized the accent. She'd heard it so many times in the messages sent to her home from here.

A path under the snow lit up and Bera followed it around to a large building constructed entirely out of metal. She walked up to the door and Ika and Voka flew up to perch on the roof. When the door opened, Bera walked in. It was warm inside. Not too warm, but certainly warm enough for Bera to take off her scarf and mask.

She had just removed her goggles when someone stepped into view. They were blue and looked like they had been made out of blocks, but Bera knew them right away.

"Ksten," she said. "I made it."

Her friend's face broke into what Bera knew to be a smile, all angles, Bera found herself enveloped in a hug that turned into a bigger hug as two more people welcomed her, arriving from either side. 

"We are so glad," they told her. "We built this for you. For your people. So you can visit whenever you wish and be warm and comfortable."

The people of Morozko, the ones who had already been here, were crystalline-based, unknowing and uncaring about warm and cold. They had been fascinated to find that the colonists who had landed on their planet needed a regulated temperature to survive.

"Did you see the Dance last night?" they asked Bera as all three led her further into the building. "It was a good one." It was good every night, but one thing the colonists and their hosts had agreed on immediately had been its beauty.

Bera took the seat that they guided her to, then unsealed her outer coat. She relaxed a little, then took out the gifts she had brought - little carved statues she and her friends had made over the years, each a different animal or place in their new home. 

"Thank you for welcoming me," she told her hosts, formal now. This wasn't first contact - that had been by messages sent between their peoples for years now - but it was the first time any humans had met their hosts face to face. This was important. Her hosts took their own seats and watched her, intent. "I am Bera Abidi. I was named for my aunt who perished when we landed. I am human and my people are from a planet called Earth. We left to find a new home when we could not survive there any longer. We are so grateful to have such gracious hosts. Please, if you would allow me, I will tell you the story of how we got here and how we survived and who we are. I am the first child of Morozko and I would tell you our tales."

Around her she heard movement as more people entered and gathered to meet her. Some of them picked up the statues and examined them. Others just sat and watched.

"Welcome, Bera Abidi of Morozko," Ksten said. "We are so glad you have come. We watched as you arrived. We saw as you built your city and took care with our world. Please, tell us your stories. Then we will tell you ours."

**Author's Note:**

> This story was based on my second-highest scoring game ever, an ice planet full of rich resources but bitterly cold. I didn't rename it when I played the game but I thought it needed something more fitting than the auto-generated name the game gave it:
> 
>  
> 
> [The game](https://www.johnayliff.com/games/seedship/index.html?bhCIrbjnp.9.El%20Dorado.1000.889.6.9.17.1000.1230.0.2017-11-6)


End file.
